


As Many Days as it Takes

by obnoxiousotter



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: 50 First Dates AU, Alternate Universe - After College/University, Car Accidents, Dates are not supposed to match up, Diary/Journal, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Memory Loss, Post-it Notes, Something about a cow, Two year age gap, orange jello, where are the cats?
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-12
Updated: 2018-01-12
Packaged: 2019-02-23 16:19:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,935
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13193856
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/obnoxiousotter/pseuds/obnoxiousotter
Summary: “Falling in love is easy, staying in love is hard.” Whoever penned those words had no idea just how right they were.It’s been five months since Shiro’s accident and things are starting to go back to normal- he hopes. He’s not too sure what normal is for him and even if he did figure out any clues about what his life was like before, he’d just forget them in the morning. Short term memory loss is what they called it but to Shiro it was more like living Hell.





	As Many Days as it Takes

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first attempt at a fic for this pair. I have a few chapter ideas but it's also written as a one shot incase I get insecure about my writing. This AU was inspired by things my husband mumbles in his sleep. 
> 
> Edit: Now that I'm not jet lagged I have made a few changes to the first chapter and am rewriting the second in its entirety.

The events of the day were seared into his brain with such intense clarity Shiro was certain he would never forget them no matter how hard he hit his head.

 

It was early evening when he finally got the keys to his apartment and he couldn’t wait to start moving in. He had made the cross-country drive in record time partly due to excitement, and partly due to the fact that his small car was so full of suitcases that the driver’s seat sat at the most uncomfortable angle imaginable.

 

To say the apartment was small would be an understatement, it was a studio after all. But, now with his suitcases inside it looked more like a walk-in closet at best. That didn’t matter though it was his apartment and he was doing this all on his own. First things first, he needed light. Shiro took the small desk lamp he had managed to fit in his bags and plugged it in in the far corner of the room. He pushed in the button, nothing. He flipped the switch on the wall and tried turning the lamp on again. Still nothing. He tried the outlet on the bottom, nothing. Frustrated he tried another outlet on a different wall. This time light accompanied the click from the button on the lamp. So, he had an outlet that didn’t work, no big deal he could handle this.

 

Looking back, he should have taken it as a sign and gotten the hell out of there but, he was naïve and young, so he stayed.

 

Shiro’s next order of business was to unpack his sleeping bag. If there was one thing he learned growing up moving every few years it was to start with your bed. The first night in a new place is exciting but it’s best to make your bed before the excitement dulls and exhaustion sets in. The thing about sleeping bags is that they are only as comfortable as the surface they are laid on which, was unfortunate for Shiro.

 

When he knelt down to unroll the sleeping bag next to the lamp he discovered just how thin the carpet was, particularly where the nails held it in place. The yelp he let out was more of surprise than pain. No problem, he just needed to find a better spot for his bed. Easier said than done. He finally settled on a spot that was diagonal in the corner behind the front door where the floor was the most even. Only a few minor issues, nothing he couldn’t handle on his own.

 

If carpet and a faulty outlet were all his troubles maybe he wouldn’t have ended up on the floor of his bathroom having a panic attack. The last straw was when he attempted to fill his Britta pitcher with water from the sink and it came out brown. Not a murky milky color, no, this was dark brown, thick, and utterly disgusting. This, was not something he could handle.

 

There was no one to hold his hand, no one that was going to get him through it. The only person he could count on was himself.

 

Shiro blinked his eyes open slowly trying to push the memories of that night back into the far corners of his mind. That night paled in comparison to what he was feeling now. At least then he knew he could count on himself. What are you supposed to do when you can’t trust yourself? He was completely at the mercy of strangers.  

 

A Knock at the door tore him from his thoughts and he rose to answer it.

* * *

 

That morning he had woken up early and lazily shuffled into the bathroom of his apartment to brush his teeth. That’s when he found the first one, a yellow post-it note on the mirror.

**_Good Morning, make yourself a strong pot of coffee you’ve got some reading to do._ **

Toothbrush in hand, Shiro bent forward to take a closer look at the note. His face displayed his confusion as his eyes narrowed trying to make sense of it. Maybe he had more to drink last night than he thought. Come to think of it, he couldn’t remember any of the events of the night before. This had Lance written all over it.

 

Shiro finished brushing his teeth and obeyed the chicken scratch on the note and made his way into the kitchen. He saw a second yellow note next to the coffee pot and rolled his eyes. Whatever Lance had written on that one could wait until after his first cup. He scooped the coffee grounds into the filter and added one extra to ensure the coffee was strong. As he waited for the coffee to brew he again tried to recall the events of the previous night.

 

If he had had enough to drink to black out where was the tell-tale headache, or any sign of a hangover for that matter? He rubbed his head as if to bring the memories back and turned to the coffee pot. He poured himself a cup and sat at the kitchen table.

 

Substantially more awake after his coffee, Shiro decided to read the second note. He walked back over to the counter and picked up the note. Being attentive to detail the fact that the note seemed to have lost its tackiness from repeated res sticking was not lost on him.

_**I know things don’t make sense the book by your chair should help** _

A knot began to form in the pit of his stomach, something was wrong. He did his best to stick the note back to the counter. What was going on? This seemed like too much effort for one of Lance’s jokes. Shiro poured himself another cup of coffee this time taking it around the corner into the living room.

 

It wasn’t too long ago that he had landed a job as a legal assistant which had resulted in an upgrade from a studio apartment to a one bedroom. At first, he felt like a king moving into a palace but, in just a few short months he had managed to fill every inch of the added space. He had convinced himself he needed another bookshelf to house all of his books when he got into law school and that every lawyer had a high-backed reading chair to review cases in.

 

His chair sat in the corner facing the window and next to it was his poor excuse of an end table. He may be a king living in a one bedroom apartment but, a king who still shops in the college furniture section of Walmart.

 

Shiro’s gaze settled on the book with a now familiar yellow post-it note sitting on the end table. Setting the cup down he sat in his chair and picked up the book reading the note.

**_You are a champion and you can overcome anything_ **

Great, those words only solidified the fact that whatever was going on wasn’t good. With a heavy sigh Shiro slowly opened the book. It was a simple journal, in his own writing which was more comforting than anything else about that morning. He turned to the first page and read the date, July 11, 2017. That was almost three years in future. Things were getting weird fast. He took a sip of his extra strong coffee and began to read.

* * *

 

_July 11, 2017_

-Sip.

_The nurse from this morning told me writing a journal would help. Too bad if it does we won’t remember her name to be able to thank her. That might be funny later. I guess I should start from the beginning which won’t take too long because the beginning started this morning. Maybe we can laugh about that one day or, everyday?_

_Moving on, seven days ago we were in a car accident._

-Sip.

_I guess Lance’s reputation for throwing parties no one remembers in the morning still rings true.  But, as far as our accident they said something about a cow, I’m still not too sure what happened. It was bad though. We hit our head so hard we knocked the last two years out of it_

-Sip.

_That’s not all, we also can’t retain any new information they call it short term memory loss. ~~I call it~~ , we? call it living hell._

Apparently, every day we wake up wanting orange jello despite the fact that we have eaten it every day this week.

-Sip.

_The doctors have no idea if our condition is permanent._

-Sip.

_This journal is for us to write down anything we want to remember because every time we fall asleep we hit the reset button on our memory. The last part I need to fill you in on is Keith._

_Remember Keith? Sure you do, we only had the most world consuming crush on him for all of our third year. Well crush no more, somehow we managed to convince him to go out with us._

-Sip. Sip.

_Maybe Keith needs the brain scans more than we do? I’m told he visits us every day._

-Empty.

* * *

Stunned, Shiro set the empty cup back on the end table. Is this real? He turned the page to read the next entry. It was about the day he was released to the care of Keith.

 

With each entry, he read it only made him more confused. How could he really be missing years of his life? Surely, he would remember dating someone for two years, or graduating college. Yet here it was right in front of him details about days he couldn’t remember.

 

At one point, he had given the journal to Keith to add entries about important life events he was missing. That’s how he found out he was accepted to his first-choice law school, or how he and Keith had come to be, about their first date, a few of their other firsts, the cats they adopted, their circle of friends/ Lance. Keith made a very clear indication that only Shiro was friends with Lance. There was a later entry where Shiro had documented asking Keith about his issues with Lance. The entry contained two crossed out sentences and large lettering underneath that saying “DO NOT ASK AGAIN!”

 

The last entry was bookmarked with a cheesy photo booth picture strip of him and Keith. The Journal was true.

Shiro read the date at the bottom, September 19, 2016. From the other entries in the journal he was able to piece together that the photos were from their one year anniversary.

 

This was all too much. He felt the room getting smaller and a tingle work its way up his arms from his fingertips. He concentrated on his breathing. When the moment passed he opened his eyes pushing the old memories back into the far reaches of his mind.

 

A knock at the door is what finally grounded Shiro back to reality. He put the journal down gently on the table and rose to answer the door.

 

“Hey Shiro, have you had a chance to read the book yet?” Keith asked awkwardly standing outside the door of the apartment. He seemed unsure of himself as he looked up at the tall man standing in the open doorway.

 

“I just finished. Come on in, Keith” He said drawing out Keith’s name in almost a whisper.

He stepped aside to let Keith in.

 

With an audible sigh of relief and a smile, Keith stepped inside ready to make Shiro fall in love with him for the 136th day in a row.

 


End file.
